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NEWSLETTER

Saving Francesca | Melina Marchetta | Reviewed by Niina

Wednesday, 1 January 2014

“I can't believe I said it out loud. The truth doesn't set you free, you know. It makes you feel awkward and embarrassed and defenseless and red in the face and horrified and petrified and vulnerable. But free? I don't feel free. I feel like shit.”- Melina Marchetta, Saving Francesca

One day Francesca's annoyingly confident and loud mother doesn't get out of bed. And suddenly Francesca has bigger problems than hating everyone at her new school, St Sebastian a former boys' school that has recently turned co-ed.

Melina Marchetta is definitely one of my favorite YA writers. One of her other books, Jellicoe Road, is one of the best YA novels I've ever read. One thing that Marchetta does brilliantly is the characters. Her characters always have depth and never feel one-dimensional. She truly knows how to write believable and likable teenage characters. They almost make me miss being sixteen. You know the wonderful time when your friends were your comfort zone and all your feelings were ten times stronger.

Melina Marchetta also knows how to touch important real-life struggles in an easy going yet touching way. In Saving Francesca the main character Francesca struggles with her mother's depression while she’s trying to find her self in a totally new environment. She’s forced out of her old group for friends, her comfort zone while her family life starts to scatter to pieces. And yes, Saving Francesca is both fun and touching. While reading it I laughed and then I cried a little.

Saving Francesca by Melina Marchetta is really close to getting 5 stars. Marchetta’s writing is as good as it gets in this genre. But I still feel that there’s something missing in this book when I compare it to Jellicoe Road(another book by Melina Marchetta). The story-line in Jellicoe Road is just something special, so original and moving. That being said, Saving Francesca is a great and really well-written YA novel! It's definitely one of my favorites in the contemporary genre! Saving Francesca gets 4,5/5 stars.